Tongue Tied

Parents are always made aware of when all doctor appointments are so that they can attend along with the foster parents (it makes life SO much easier when it comes to giving signed consent too!)

Bram's six month immunizations were coming up, and Erin and I decided that it would be a good idea to approach Bram's doctor about getting a referral for his tongue.  Not only was he a jumping machine, but he was indeed a puking machine.  

Because Erin had gone through this with her oldest son, she was even more eager to get the procedure done.  She was a new and young mother when her oldest was born and, like most of us when we are new and young moms, did what the doctors said.  When she was concerned about her son's speech development, they told her he was autistic (damn, aren't they labeling everyone with autism nowadays!)  She knew in her gut that it had something to do with his tongue, but no one would trust her mother's intuition and she could  not get the doctor's to listen to her.  He was put in special classes and was told he would never be in regular education classes.  She pressed and pressed and pressed and after four years, she finally got someone to take her inquiries seriously.  He had the operation at four years old, and "miraculously," his speech was suddenly growing by leaps and bounds and he wasn't "autistic" anymore and didn't need to be in special classes.  What bullshit. 

She did NOT want that to happen to Bram.  He was smart and curious and aware, but he was definitely not vocalizing or babbling like Baby O was at even younger ages.  

Still, any surgery is super scary for a baby.  Putting them under anesthesia is  risky, especially for surgery that isn't life-threatening.  Still, we pushed on.

My neighbor Cindy, who was retired from working in a doctor's office for many years, was shocked.  "Why didn't they just do it in the doctor's office?  It's a thirty second procedure!  We did that all the time when I worked in the office.  Why put this poor baby through all this?"

I decided that if we didn't get the referral, I was going to bring "Grandma Cindy" to the office to tell them off.

Erin had to keep Ibro from going there and threatening them.  All we wanted was a referral.  If the experts said it wasn't a good idea for him to have it this young, we would have (reluctantly) kept our mouths shut.

After pressing and pressing and pressing, they finally gave us a referral, but not to a doctor.  Because anesthesia and surgery is so very scary for a baby, we were referred to a dentist who specialized in cutting the lingual frenulum (think rubber band under your tongue) with a laser.  It was relatively painless, required no anesthesia, no cutting, no blood, and took about two seconds.  


We were referred to Reaves Dental which, oddly enough, is the husband of a former coworker.  It was decided that yes, Bram should undergo the procedure.  We were scheduled for the next week.  The worst part of it for him was that he was made to wear goggles and couldn't pull them off.  The worst part for all four of us (Erin, Ibro, me, and Darryl) was that we were not allowed in the room.  He was literally out within five minutes.

We were given silly exercises to give him, like sticking our tongue out at him so he could mimic us and to put yogurt on the sides of his mouth so he would have to lick it off.  He literally had to learn that his tongue could move outside the confines of his mouth.

It actually took another procedure (his was thick and needed to be re-lasered, plus, he was a squirmy six month old), but overall it was a success.

When he stuck his tongue out for the first time, it was akin to a baby taking his first steps.  We were that thrilled!